Steve,

Great pictures!

The Vanagon is plenty strong, so far mine has survived hitting a deer at
50 MPH and a Honda Civic that ran a stop sign as I was passing through
(at low speed) with only sheet metal damage, no structural damage at
all.

What bothers me about these clips is that there is no way to weld all
those box sections back together internally, only the outer surfaces get
welded.  A vehicle with a replacement clip like this would look good but
not be structurally sound.

I hope that clip doesn't end up intact on a Vanagon and that only
non-structural parts off of it were used.

I'll probably see you down at Bry's someday!

Stuart